Thursday Night Widows [Paperback]

Claudia Piñeiro (Author), Miranda France (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2010

"An agile novel written in a language perfectly pitched for the subject matter, a ruthless dissection of a fast decaying society"—José Saramago, Nobel Prize winner

The English translation of hit novel Las Viudas de Los Jueves!

“Piñeiro’s clever U.S. debut.. . illuminates the hypocrisies of the country's upper classes after 9/11.”—Publishers Weekly

“Piñeiro is particularly skilful at exposing the social forces undermining Argentine society, and the fragility of personal relationships. We learn the surprising truth of the three men’s death in the final chapter; the build-up to it is riveting.”—The Times (London)

"Piñeiro builds up tension through banal, domestic details and the accretion of despair in everyday marital and professional struggles. There may be bloody murder at the centre of this novel, but the dystopia portrayed is an indictment not solely of an assassin but of Argentina’s class structure and the willful blindness of its petty bourgeoisie."—Times Literary Supplement

“A razor-sharp psychological and social portrait not only of Argentina, but of the afluent Western world as a whole.”—Rosa Montero

Three bodies lie at the bottom of a swimming pool in a gated country estate near Buenos Aires. It's Thursday night at the magnificent Scaglia house. Behind the locked gates, shielded from the crime, poverty, and filth of the people on the streets, the Scaglias and their friends hide lives of infidelity, alcoholism, and abusive marriage. Claudia Piñeiro's novel eerily foreshadowed a criminal case that generated a scandal in the Argentine media. But this is more than a story about crime. The suspense is a byproduct of Piñeiro's hand at crafting a psychological portrait of a professional class that lives beyond its means and leads secret lives of deadly stress and despair. It takes place during the post-9/11 economic meltdown in Argentina, but it is a universal story that will resonate among credit-crunched readers of today.

The film of Thursday Night Widows, by Argentine New Wave and award-winning director Marcelo Piñeyro is coming soon with trailers available online.

Claudia Piñeiro was a journalist, playwright, and television scriptwriter and in 1992 won the prestigious Pléyade Annual Journalism Award. She has more recently turned to fiction and is the author of literary crime novels that are all bestsellers in Latin America and have been translated into four languages. This novel won the Clarin Prize for fiction and is her first title to be available in English.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Near the start of Piñeiro's clever U.S. debut, which won Argentina's Clarin Prize for fiction and has been made into a film, the bodies of three well-to-do men—El Tano Scaglia, Martín Urovich and Gustavo Masotta—turn up in the Scaglias' swimming pool in Cascades Heights, a gated community outside Buenos Aires. The three men, along with Ronie Guevara, regularly had dinner on Thursday nights at one of their houses in this exclusive enclave. The search for the truth behind their deaths takes a backseat to the soap operaish goings-on of the Cascade Heights set, as seen in flashbacks largely through the eyes of Guevara's realtor wife, Virginia. Readers with an interest in contemporary Argentina will appreciate how this crime novel illuminates the hypocrisies of the country's upper classes after 9/11. (Jan.)
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From Booklist

In an exclusive gated community 30 miles outside of Buenos Aires, Maria Virginia works as a real-estate agent after her husband loses his job. Readers gradually become acquainted with the rich families of the Heights through Maria, who is privy to their secrets, selling them their homes while living in the community herself. But she is always a bit of an outsider, one of the few women who work, and when the bodies of three of the most prominent men in the community are found dead in a neighbor’s backyard pool, she must decide where her loyalties lie, since her husband was visiting the three men shortly before their deaths. A fast-paced thriller, Pineiro’s novel describes and critiques the lifestyles of Argentina’s nouveau riche, chronicling their rise into the exclusive world of the Heights and their downfalls as the economy sours after 9/11. An excellent choice for fans of international crime stories. --Jessica Moyer

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Product Details

• Paperback: 269 pages
• Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press; Tra edition (January 1, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1904738419
• ISBN-13: 978-1904738411
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #459,999 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "There's no doubt that The Cascade can be an isolating place and that's not necessarily a bad thing.", March 11, 2010

By 

Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: Thursday Night Widows (Paperback)

Despite the tacky cover, this book is no potboiler. Instead, the cover accurately reflects the values of the beautiful people of Cascade Heights, a gated and walled residential community thirty miles outside Buenos Aires with full-service security-along with a golf course and top-quality tennis. The wealthy residents of The Cascade have left their old lives behind, and low live in elaborately built houses with spectacular landscaping, a world apart. Argentine author Claudia Pineiro carefully analyzes the behavior of these residents, concentrating, in particular, on four couples-Ronie and Virginia Guevara, El Tano and Teresa Scaglia, Gustavo and Carla Masotta, and Martin and Lala Urovich-who live in the same neighborhood. The men play cards at El Tano's house every Thursday night while the women go to the cinema.

The novel begins on Thursday night, September 27, 2001, when Teresa Scaglia returns home and doesn't hear any noise from the card room or pool. She soon discovers that El Tano and two of his friends are dead. Using Virginia Guevara, a real estate agent who also lives in the compound, as the primary narrator, the author dissects the lives of these characters in the ten years leading up to this September, 2001 event, skewering their pretenses, their blatant dishonesty, their flouting of the law, and their feeling of entitlement. Recent years have been marked by a severe economic downturn in Argentina, however. As Virginia says: "Many of our neighbors made the mistake of thinking that they could keep spending as much as they earned forever. And what they earned was a lot, and seemed eternal. But there comes a day when the taps are turned off."

With her tongue firmly set in her cheek, the author creates a story filled with dark ironies, and by making their problems similar to those of any other self-protecting, upscale suburban community, regardless of country, she succeeds in creating identification between the outrageous characters and her readers. These characters' lives are just close enough to the norm that they seem in many ways "ordinary," their behavior, however extreme, common enough that it is easily recognizable for what it is. Their casual dishonesty is a given. Because they are extreme stereotypes, they are laughable.

By the time the reader discovers how the men have died, that revelation comes as no surprise. Interesting for its picture of the effects of a global economic downturn on one community of wealthy businessmen, it is also an unforgettable picture of the empty lives which these men and their wives are happy to lead-the "causes" they adopt which accomplish nothing, their view of reality which is limited to their own social class, the inability to communicate with anyone because their individual lives are so egocentric. Great fun to read and often darkly humorous, this novel is a clear and uncomplicated social commentary which readers from many parts of the world may enjoy. Mary Whipple

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gripping Tale of Drama in Argentina, January 22, 2010

By 

Gamma (SF Bay Area) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Thursday Night Widows (Paperback)

This book was everything I hoped it would be, based on the intriguing description. Now that I've read it, I'm eagerly awaiting future English translations of works by Claudia Pineiro. I'd also like to see the movie based on this book, currently in production by director Marcelo Piñeyro. I'm so thankful for Bitter Lemon Press, the publisher who keeps finding these gems of novels - such as this one, and the Havana Quartet by Leonardo Padura.

I found it incredibly unusual to set a crime novel in a lush, gated community outside Buenos Aires. I thought I would be struck by how different life in Argentina is - but for these moderately wealthy characters, it seems that their cares, worries, anxieties - even flaws and shallowness - are much more similar to USA or UK than I would have expected. The story takes place in 2001, with flashbacks throughout the 1990s - during times of economic upheaval and job losses. The current economic crisis made the story hit home a bit more, especially as everyone I know has the same worries (as the main characters in this book) about their job, career, finances.

However, this is a rich, fun tale - a dark comedy really - about a set of richly drawn characters who do crazy things. Thoroughly enjoyable - I read it in just 2 days.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars interesting look at Argentina, January 8, 2010

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Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Thursday Night Widows (Paperback)

As Argentina falls apart due to an economic collapse of incredible proportions just after 9/11, the country seems on the verge of anarchy with no place that is safe. That is except for the well to do living in gated communities that insulate them from what is going on outside except for the TV news and their outside employment.

In the Buenos Aires gated community Cascade Heights, four men (El Tano Scaglia, Martín Urovich Gustavo Masotta and Ronie Guevara) have dinner together every Thursday night. However, this time is different as three lie dead in the swimming pool at the most affluent Scaglia home; only Guevara who left early remains alive. How could this happen especially to someone as influential and powerful as El Tano is on the minds of their family members as all assume a horrific electrical accident occurred. However, Virginia Guevara though curious and shocked fears for her Ronie who behaves strangely since the incident and she believes he knows something more.

This is an interesting look at Argentina in which the upper class behaved like Nero fiddling away while the country collapsed. The story line is mostly told through Virginia's eyes as a successful realtor to the wealthy. Although insightful with a strong cast who warn readers to beware of growing exponential gaps between the affluent and the middle class, the mystery of the pool takes a back seat to the discerning look at the gilded life behind the gated community.

Harriet Klausner